Remarks by Paul Macaluso
54 remarks on the record, newest first · Page 1 of 3
- Play at 17:09
“Okay. Community planning month, October 2026. Whereas change is constant and affects all cities, towns, suburbs, counties, boroughs, townships, rural areas, and other places. And whereas planners can help navigate this change with data-driven insights and expertise that provide better choices for how people work and live. Whereas community planning provides an opportunity for all residents to be meaningfully involved in making choices that determine the future of their community, and whereas the full benefits of planning requires public elected and appointed officials who understand, support,…”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 57:56
“Does accepting the award prevent any difficulties or struggles if we were to review the program or look at ways to modify the program at all?”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 58:11
“Yeah, to accept the award. Does that restrict us from being able to make any kind of changes to the program at all in the future?”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 1:04:09
Not quoted here: it may name a member of the public. Hear it at the meeting.
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 1:06:22
“I would think maybe the worst case scenario is we might have to give them some of the money back if we decide not to continue with the cameras. But I think that funding for the drone is important. It's not a continued surveillance kind of issue. So to me, it seems pretty clear that we should accept it.”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 1:11:55
“Question for the personnel. You had sent out a message kind of giving us an idea of what vacancy rates you use to kind of anticipate when you're considering the total expenses of the personnel. Is that accurate?”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 1:12:10
“So how accurate has that been in the last five years? I mean, is it something that you're constantly reviewing and considering, or is it something that was in place 10 years ago and still being used today?”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 1:14:17
“Well, I just, I only ask because, you know, these amounts of money end up coming up in our budget discussions. And so if we're either overestimating vacancy rate or underestimating it, it could affect us. Yes, sir.”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 1:36:31
“a little disappointed in the presentation because we had like specific discussion in our retreats and I don't feel like any of that was addressed. I think the majority of us wanted to at least look at what it was if it was kept at the current rate that wasn't given to us at all. And also, you know, had discussions on trying to lower the INS rate in the future. I didn't see anything involved with that either. And so I feel like I'm not getting the information that we had asked for. And I don't know if anybody else agrees with me on that. But and this this thought about if we don't fund the…”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 1:38:22
“I don't think anybody wanted to get rid of the dispatchers. I think everybody was on board with bringing on the dispatchers, improving their pay, everything along with that. I think everybody... or at least the majority of us want to see, is there an opportunity somewhere else to save money? And that was not shown to us at all. It was just kind of completely ignored. So.”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 1:39:23
“For the future. Yeah, I understood that, but that was kind of, and that's something that we would need to discuss now.”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 1:53:37
“Yeah. The state feels cities have bloated budgets. They're gonna continue to work at trying to lessen the revenue that cities have. And so our answer is, well, let's just continue to go back and increase the property taxes, increase the property tax. We're gonna do that every single year. That's the only way you're gonna do that is to increase the property tax unless your sales tax increases a lot. So I think it's bad practice for us to continue to jump the tax rate. I mean, at some point in time, our spending has to slow, and that doesn't mean giving up any safety. I don't think anyone up…”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 1:56:38
“Well, I'm not just talking about senior citizens. I'm talking about disabled individuals. I mean, there's a lot of people that are on fixed incomes. Single moms, I mean, if you've lived in that life before, you know how tight $50 a month is. So I think you have to give those people consideration as well.”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 2:50:51
“yeah staff was accurate in terms of what their recommendation was i think we've been pretty consistent with trying to keep that uh in as gb because you know again we're not just looking at today we're looking at 10 15 20 years from now and uh we only have so that that gives us opportunity for good retail sales tax i think this is an unfortunate one because we do have a good business there that uh you know has been a fairly long time resident of the area. But I think when you consider all the options that GB2 allows, I just, to me, wouldn't be able to support that. So I support the…”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 2:51:53
“I'll make a recommendation of denial, or I'll make a motion.”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 3:03:23
“Yeah, I was going to say that just the whole time you were doing the presentation, I was thinking of how can we help them? How can we make it easier for them? So I was glad that you did have that as part of the recommendation. I think anywhere and everywhere we can find a way to make it easier, less expensive to help them. I think that we should look at that, at least from my side.”
City Council · Sep 15, 2026
- Play at 17:19
“But I think it's our responsibility to look at how can we make it work at the current tax rate. You know, I'm a true believer that when our housing values go up and down, we should benefit from that. I don't think that when our housing value goes down, our tax rate will go up so that we're paying the same amount of property tax. So I asked you that question, and I appreciate you getting this out for me, but I think that When I evaluate the list and it's not something that obviously I'm educated enough to know the importance of all of these, but I'm not just going to say that it should be just…”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 26:34
“I don't think, I mean, I know I'm not proposing laying off any current staff.”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 26:43
“And when you say that sales tax could be a little bit higher than what you anticipated, what does that look like?”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 28:02
“Actually, I was going to ask about that, if you could. I saw that the projection was kind of in line with what the previous years were. Is that... not including Home Depot, or is that not given that much of a consideration? Because I would think that it would maybe be a higher growth rate than what's projected on there.”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 29:21
“I know you guys are in a difficult position because I understand that DVHS is making it more and more difficult. And that ends up putting more responsibility on the homeowners. But at the same time, I think that trend is just going to continue where we're going to get less and less revenue. And if we just continue with our expenses on the path that we are... we're going to end up being in bad shape down the road.”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 29:47
“Without having to just continue to increase the property tax every single year.”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 31:54
“I mean, you know, just kind of recap. I just wanted us to at least evaluate the ability to maybe remove up to a million dollars so that we remain the same property tax rate, but also have a long-term plan on lowering the INS with putting some of that money towards future debt. So that was what I think we should at least consider and evaluate.”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 49:10
“I would like to hear from the other council members before I comment more. Okay.”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026
- Play at 1:06:05
“I thought I recall us going above the no new rep, no new revenue rate last year. If I remember right. Yeah. Yes. So I know that since I've been here every year, we've gone up and up. Okay. It hasn't gone down at all. Um, I have, um, police chief has been very, very vocal about the need for dispatchers and I've, wouldn't disagree that they're needed so i think if there was anything not to to get rid of it would probably be that um and i know that their pay increases are included in here as well which i don't think anybody's interested in removing that i know for one i have zero interest in…”
City Council · Aug 25, 2026